


Pain

by walkingwookie



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Hux is a Dick, I had an itch, One Shot, Post TLJ, Short One Shot, Short not sweet, Why Did I Write This?, fuck hux, reylo?, sorry - Freeform, two minutes post tlj
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-30
Updated: 2018-06-30
Packaged: 2019-05-30 19:44:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15103670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/walkingwookie/pseuds/walkingwookie
Summary: Ben finds himself struggling to comprehend his emotions in the moments following Rey closing the door on him...





	Pain

**Author's Note:**

> Post TLJ, takes place immediately after Rey closes the door on Ben and the dice disappear. Enjoy! :D

Ben sits alone on the floor of the old base.

It’s always most dangerous for Ben to be alone. When he’s alone, he’s victim to his thoughts and those can do more damage and inflict more pain than a weapon ever could.

He should be used to the feeling of being alone, after all the years of experiencing it, but this time the loneliness doesn’t greet him like an old friend. The loneliness that greets him is empty, cold, and wrought with pain.

Ben doesn’t try to fight back the tears that threaten to break free. They escape from his prison after being held captive for too many years. They fall freely and Ben is jealous of the beads of sadness. Jealous of the freedom they have.

Ben is being held captive by his own decisions. The paths he has chosen to take were bumpy but he assumed would lead him to glory. However, now that he has all the power in the universe, Ben realizes power doesn’t equal glory. Nor does it lead to happiness.

Ben wants to be free of his pain. Free of the pain he can never seem to escape. Free of the feeling that courses through his veins.

Ben wants to be _free_.

Ben can still feel the weight of his Dad’s dice in his hand, the power they still manage to hold over him is immense.

He wants to be free of the pain he brought his father. Free of all the years his decisions hurt his mother. But he can’t, Ben knows that’s not how it works. He’s made the decisions he’s made and now he must live with the consequences. Ben finds the irony of how unfair life can be unamusing.  

Still, Ben waits as he wishes his pain could vanish with a snap of someone’s fingers. He waits despite not knowing what for.

Maybe he’s waiting for Rey to come back?

No. That’s impossible, Ben knows that Rey will never return.

Accepting the truth of that is more painful to Ben than anything Snoke ever did to hurt him. Ben would rather be struck with Force lighting a million times before seeing Rey’s expression when he asked her to join him again.

He asked her to do the impossible because he’d done the impossible so many times before. If he’d done the impossible, Ben assumed she could too. But Ben’s assumption was wrong. _Is_ wrong.

Ben sinks further to the floor. No longer on his knees, Ben longs for a hug, for touch, but his longing is immediately shut down when he remembers that anyone who’s ever given him that kind of affection has hurt him. Intentional or not.

The image of Luke’s green saber still fills Ben’s mind. The memory haunts him, it’s a ghost that can never find resolve. Ben feels that Luke has passed on through the Force but that isn’t enough for him. He will never be able to come to terms with what his uncle did. _Never_. Ben will never find closure with his Uncle and now that he’s one with the Force he never can. Ben wishes he could turn back time to host a civil conversation with his former master’s apparition, could he have done the impossible once again?

The green saber that has haunted Ben for years seems so appealing right about now. Ben thinks about how much better the galaxy would have been if Luke _had_ acted on his impulses all those years ago. What if Ben had never woken up? Luke would’ve sliced through his body eradicating the darkness plaguing his mind for good.

He would’ve been free from his pain.

Ben’s hand finds his own saber. His hand runs over the saber’s length, his thumb pauses over the power switch. It would be so easy to _click_. Everything would be over in the blink of an eye. The pain would finally be gone. Would it be that easy?

Ben’s thumb presses down, but he hesitates. Why is he hesitating?

Ben finds himself lost in silence, devoured by the stillness of Crait’s air. He can’t do it. Just like he couldn’t fire on his mother. Is this the same hesitation Luke faced?

Ben wonders once again what the galaxy could’ve become had Luke followed through with his plan. Would everything be better? Would the New Republic still be in power? Ben doesn’t think so, Snoke was still lurking in the outer regions building the First Order. _He still would’ve emerged with Hux as his puppy instead of me,_ Ben thinks. Had he been killed, his mother would’ve taken a step back from politics. Wouldn’t she? Then again, when she lost her planet and everyone she cared for, she carried on just as strong if not stronger. Maybe the galaxy would’ve become what it was destined to be after the fall of the empire, maybe Ben was still the only thing preventing that from happening.

Ben presses his thumb on the switch once again but is faced with more cowardice. He can’t do it.

Ben’s mind is no longer filled with the vision of Luke’s saber. The saber has been replaced by a pair of eyes. Two simple eyes that changed everything.

The only two eyes in the galaxy that mattered to him were all he could see. The eyes that held both the desert sun and the forest floor within them now seemed to haunt him. Two eyes Ben was sure he would only see again in death.

Ben wondered if he could fall to the light side for a pair of pretty eyes? Could he? He killed Snoke for them, but were they enough to go fully light? No, Ben decided they weren’t, but they were enough to prevent him from being fully dark.

The pair of beautifully hazel eyes were yet another roadblock in his emersion in the dark side. Ben wondered if being dark was supposed to be this hard. Usually, you just were dark, born dark. Ben _had_ to _try_ to be dark. It didn’t come naturally to him, but neither did the light.

If he’s not light or dark, then what is he?

Ben considers himself dark, but his heart has always betrayed him and it won’t stop now.

Ben’s fingers leave the hilt of his saber and instead, find his cloak. They twist and grab the material just to offer a distraction from the pain that still seems to define him.

Ben hears familiar footsteps approach him from behind. He doesn’t need to reach out with the force to figure out who it is. Anyone who walks that heavily and unevenly can only be referred to as Armitage Hux, or as Ben likes to call him, dickass.

Ben takes a deep and shaky breath as the man stops behind him. Ben doesn’t dare turn to acknowledge the rabbit cur, not after he’s been letting his emotions get the best of him.  Not after he’s grown weak for a simple pair of eyes.

Ben registers the sound of metal against a holster before he feels a blaster close against his back. Had Ben wanted to fight back, Hux’s neck would be broken and he’d be laying on the floor dead right now. But Ben isn’t sure that’s what he wants anymore. Ben is tired of fighting, he just wants peace.

“Supreme Leader, you are unfit to rule,” Hux begins his carefully thought out monologue but Ben pays him, nor his words, any attention. Hux doesn’t deserve his attention nor has he earned his respect.

Ben knows Hux’s greater plan and he just wants him to get on with it.

Why drag on the inevitable?

After some time, Hux finally wraps up his monologue. “…I am removing you from power. Given our history, I’m allowing you to speak some choice last words. Make them good, they’re going to be used as propaganda.”

Ben wasn’t going to Hux the pleasure of his last words being pleas for sparing him.

He chose his words carefully and spoke them with confidence in a monotone voice.

“A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away a story began, now I’m here to say ‘the end’.”

Ben’s skin tickled as the pair of eyes he almost threw everything away for appeared before him for the last time.

Ben felt his pain melt away as the blaster shot erupted in the air. Hux turned and left Ben to die like the animal he was. Alone and helpless.

But he wasn’t alone, he was accompanied by the eyes. Not only the eyes but the whole girl.  

Little did either of them know, they were a lot more connected than they’d originally thought. Ben’s blaster wound lay directly beside his heart and was mirrored beside Rey’s own heart. Together, the pain the two of them had experienced throughout their lives evaporated as they fell into an eternal sleep in each other’s arms.

They were finally _free._

**Author's Note:**

> This was my idea of what would happen if there was no third movie in the sequel trilogy. Thank god there is a third film because we need some real Reylo and we need it now! ;) 
> 
>  
> 
> Man, in all of my one shots I keep killing Ben! What is wrong with me?! I want him to live but there's so much internal conflict surrounding Ben and Rey that I can explore when I kill him off. 
> 
>  
> 
> Comments and kudos are always appreciated! Thanks for reading! Check me out on tumblr @walkingwookie


End file.
